Module 2 Blog

Commercial Hypermedia Product

            Interactive or electronic storybooks aid students in improving their reading skills at their own pace (Roblyer & Doering, 2012, p. 175). In my personal experience, electronic reading has been restricted to e-books on tablets or my Nook—however, I do recall reading paperback Goosebumps books that allowed the reader to choose how the story progressed based on the page numbers they chose to follow. I personally found those types of books to be stressful (I hated making the wrong decision in the book—in one story, I was killed by a mummy) but I can see how the Choose-Your-Own-Adventure books could appeal to children. In fact, Roblyer and Doering (2012) cite studies that “reported positive impact of interactive storybooks on children’s enjoyment of reading and development of reading skills” (p. 175). My most recent experience with an e-book involved my MAT study book on my Nook—it was ‘interactive’ in the sense that all of the chapters were hyperlinked for easy access. One benefit to electronic storybooks (and by extension, electronic textbooks) involves the audio function. I often find myself mispronouncing words that I have read but never heard. Electronic storybooks can read out words with which students might be unfamiliar (Roblyer & Doering, 2012, p. 175). The subject matter of the storybooks can be useful for certain lessons—in the link I found for a hypermedia product, some of the books deal with actual lesson topics, such as Jane Austen or Shakespeare’s work.

     Here is a link to a site with some examples of electronic storybooks and their uses. This list consists of twelve books for the 13+ age group. Some deal with peer issues and bullying, others deal with school subject matter.

http://www.goodreads.com/list/show/82180.Best_Interactive_Story_Books_for_Teens

Chosen Multimedia Authoring Tool

            The multimedia audio and video production tools allow for a myriad of classroom uses. The textbook lists podcasts, vodcasts, and “student-produced media” as a means to expand classroom tools (Roblyer & Doering, 2012, p. 189). I have experienced the Audacity audio editor and recorder, an open source audio system that allows you to record, convert, and mix audio. My Spanish teacher used it for oral exams—we would record our responses to prompts, and she would grade them at her leisure. While I did not do well on that test, I can still see the value of the multimedia tool Audacity. For example, I could use Audacity by assigning an interview-style history project in which the students create a podcast of them interviewing a historical figure of their choice. A podcast involves "digitized audio files saved in a format that can be shared over the Internet" (Roblyer & Doering, 2012, p. 189). They could either splice their interview questions with sound bytes of the actual figure to make it sound like an interview, or they could voice-act both as the interviewer and the historical figure. It would be a fun way to bring history to life.

            Here is a link to information about Audacity and its uses: http://sourceforge.net/projects/audacity/

Embed

Here is a long video on how to use Audacity

And here is a short video tutorial for students:

References

Roblyer, M.D. & Doering, A.H. (2012). Integrating educational technology into teaching (6th ed.). Columbus, OH: Merrill Prentice Hall.